A Model of SustainableLiving: Collective Identityin an Urban Ecovillage

摘要

Ecovillages are burgeoning communitarian phenomena in postindustrialized countries whosemembers push for ecologically sustainable change. The author situated a case study of an urbanecovillage in the social movement literatures on political opportunity structures and collectiveidentity construction in an endeavor to bridge macro-structural movement and micro-identityconstruction theories. Using participant observation and interview data from ecovillagers, sheanswers three research questions to investigate how ecovillagers’ collective goals for sustainabilityare negotiated in the context of regulations and dominant consumer ideologies. Informed byliteratures on collective identity, the author asked, “What are ecovillagers’ goals? What workdo they do in their everyday lives to achieve these goals?” Additionally, to understand villagers’interactions with political opportunity structures, she asked, “How do members negotiateactions within a larger political environment that both facilitates and constrains them?” Fromher data, she determined how ecovillagers conceptualize their collective identity and actionswithin the context of constraining institutions.